While automated manufacturing processes have benefited a number of industries, the automated manufacturing of soft goods made from pliable items has proven challenging to automate. For example, the manufacturing of shoes and, more particularly, shoe uppers, has long involved a large amount of hand labor. Because shoe uppers are often formed largely or entirely from multiple pliable items that are affixed together to form the completed shoe upper, even the fundamental manufacturing operation of picking up a part for a shoe upper and appropriately placing that part relative to other components has been a challenge to automate.